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NW Fishletter #319, June 28,
2013
[4] Model Being Developed To Gauge FishTagging Costs
The Northwest Power and Conservation
Council's Independent Economics Analysis Board
has developed a model that tries to measure
costs of using four different types of fish tags,
and the results are very complicated, said
Oregon State University economist and IEAB
member Bill Jaeger at the council's June 12
meeting.
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The project is part of the work of the region's
fish-tagging forum that is looking at ways to
improve costs and benefits of the Columbia
Basin's fish-tagging efforts, which cost BPA
about $58 million last year.
Jaeger, who did most of the work to develop
the model, cautioned that there were limits to
what it could do because of the qualitative
differences in the different tagging systems.
Four different types of tags were reviewed-coded-wire tags, used mainly for harvest
studies; PIT tags, used widely for juvenile
survival studies and adult return rates; and two
types of genetic markers, Population Based
Tagging (PBT) and Genetic Stock Identification
(GSI).
Jaeger said the world of tagging, sampling and
recovering fish tags varies widely from one
group to the next, with many spillovers,
interconnections and shared benefits. The costs
to fulfill detection requirements vary greatly
across release sites, species, and
detection/recovery locations.
He produced a table that showed his model
results estimating the incremental cost for
increasing detections by just one fish for
different species. For spring Chinook, the cost
ranged from $31 for juvenile spring Chinook
tagged at Wenatchee and detected at
Bonneville, to $443 for adult spring Chinook
tagged at Umatilla and detected at Rock Island.
The cost to increase detection at Bonneville by
one juvenile steelhead from the Lower Snake
was $36, while increasing adult detections at
Little Goose Dam by one more steelhead from
the Lower Snake was estimated to cost $441.
http://www.newsdata.com/fishletter/319/4story.html
8/26/2013
Northwest Fishletter
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Jaeger's model also pegged costs for increasing
CWT recovery by one tag as well. For fall
Chinook tagged in the lower Columbia caught in
the Oregon coastal fishery that was estimated
at $2,378; for a spring/summer Chinook tagged
in the Methow River and caught off the
Washington coast, it amounted to $3,682. But it
would only cost $335 for one more recovery if
that occurred in the Alaska fishery.
What is causing that big discrepancy in some
costs? One factor may be the large sampling
effort needed in certain fisheries where some
CWT stocks have such low prevalence, said
Jaeger.
Jaeger said CWT costs are lower than genetic
tags for harvest data under most conditions,
given current costs, but the reverse may be
true in a "non-mixed" fishery. He said the model
can be refined to get at questions of prioritizing
tagging efforts from different subbasins, but
first, the modelers must be assured that it truly
reflects fish biology. That might mean a review
by the council's independent science advisory
board.
The council agreed to put the model out for
public comment until July 26. -B. R.
The following links were mentioned in this
story:
a model
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8/26/2013